FIDE Ethics Commission ruling on ICGA/Rybka complaint

[bob]

I can't imagine why the SF guys don't enter that event. They don't even have to attend. Then they could win, and actually have another title in hand.

You would let them enter?

As I said previously, I wish they WOULD enter. At least if someone files a protest it would be a LOT less work to compare SF 6 (or whatever) to whatever program was supposedly copied from. I don't think there is any doubt SF is different enough from Fruit that there is zero problems there. Just as the Ferret/gnuchess comparison I did many years ago showed that Bruce had modified and rewritten everything over time, so that there was not even a "ghost" of gnuchess left inside.

However, that said, as I mentioned _I_ have not compared SF to anything myself, and so have no hint that it is a derivative that would fail to pass ICGA rule 2. Based on what I know, the exact opposite is true and it would easily satisfy that rule. But I suspect we will never see any of this "put to the test."

Whatever happened about Loop, which was purported to be a clearcut non-original engine (if I recall you correctly)?
I see it benefitted from a promotion in placings in at least one tournament after Rybka was removed from the records. That makes a further mockery of what happened over Rybka.

The investigation is certainly over, and was conclusive. David has had no luck contacting the author so far as I know. Next time I communicate with him I will ask where it stands. It is out of our hands, however (our => the secretariat/panel).

[syzygy]

The investigation is certainly over, and was conclusive.

Conclusive?

Conclusive like: we've made up our minds?

[Dirt]

I get an untrusted connection message.

Really?

Yes - really.
Otherwise I wouldn't have posted as such?

If it was my bank or other sensitive site I would be concerned. Since it isn't I added an exception.

[Terry McCracken]

The investigation is certainly over, and was conclusive.

Conclusive?

Conclusive like: we've made up our minds?

No, it means they know and it's over.

[Terry McCracken]

I get an untrusted connection message.

Really?

Yes - really.
Otherwise I wouldn't have posted as such?

If it was my bank or other sensitive site I would be concerned. Since it isn't I added an exception.

It is very different of course in that case. Some people are too cautious and have the settings in the browser to be overly restrictive.

Having powerful anti-malware, antivirus with real-time protection on including firewalls is actually safer and more flexible.

If they can't stop it then neither can Firefox.

[hgm]

Pretending to the outside world that Marco, Joona and Tord agreed to participation in an ICGA tournament would in fact appear to be an illegal form of misrepresentation to me and possibly criminal.

This is an utterly absurd claim. Which law exactly would have been broken? According to this 'reasoning' TCEC is illegal, and Martin Thoresen possibly a criminal for including engines without obtaining written permission of the authors. While in fact he just useslegally obtained software in accordance with the license agreement.

So the ICGA would have to act very carefully, making clear that SF was being entered behind the backs of Marco, Joona and Tord. And they'd have something to explain to the actual competitors.

It is fully upto the ICGA to determine which criteria they will apply for admitting a legally-obtained program in the WCCC. There can be nothing illegal about running software in accordance with its license agreement. If the ICGA decides that they consider anyone that can count to 5 sufficiently qualified to enter Stockfish, it is upto them. The license agreement of Stockfish does not require you to declare the opinion or state of mind of its authors, or indeed mention them at all (as long as you don't spread binaries).

BTW, Tord has already declared in public here that he agrees with this interpretation of the GPL: anyone can enter Stockfish in whatever tournament he wishes.

And as far as 'explaining to the actual competitors' is concerned: that is ICGA's problem. Why allow them to dodge it by chickening out yourself? I'd say it is better to force them to clean up their act once and for all.

[Henk]

What if I created an engine with 1000 ELO and make it open source. Some unknown other people change it over the years into a top engine. I use that engine to win an important tournament and I receive the price for I am the only known author.

[hgm]

Indeed. So what? Like every year, next June the CSVN will conduct a 'user tournament', where people that have bought a Mephisto or a Chess Challenger and such bring it with them, play them against each other for one day, and get a prize when 'their' machine won the most games. None of them contributed anything to the development of the program or hardware. That they show up and bring the thing with them is already enough. None of them sees anything remotely strange in this, let alone illegal. None of them carry a written permission by Frans Morsch or Kate Spracklen or whoever programmed their machine to appoint them as their legal representative. None of the participants of the CSVN user tourney was ever jailed because their participation was a criminal offense...

[Henk]

That is a user tournament. Not a programmers tournament.

People that win a lottery get prizes too. People that join risk their money or time.

Better create a category single author. In normal chess you also don't play with a group.

[hgm]

A tournament is what you want it to be. It is up to the organizer to decide that. WCCC has never been (or had a sub-category) 'single author'. There is nothing in "Computer Chess" that implies 'single author'. I don't think it is a good idea to have such a sub-category. You would exclude programs for no good reason, while they idea is to allow as many programs to participate as possible. There is no reason why single-author programs would be systematically better or worse than team efforts. And there would be no way to actually enforce the rule; programs could have been secretly written by a group, and be presented by a single 'front', and you could never know.